Puppy sadness

The puppies are mobile.  They're all over the laundry room and climbing through the gate as of last night...  I might need to weave some cardboard through the gate towards the bottom...

Anyway, there have been a couple puppies that have NOT been happy lately and giving off a lot of unnecessary barks and whines.  Last night I noticed one barking off by itself several feet from her mommy who was nursing the others.  I noticed how much smaller she was than the others... So I picked her up and moved her close to Ellie and the others to nurse.

This morning, Meri brought her to me.  She said that this pup was acting like she had a broken neck or back and the pup wouldn't stop screaming!  And she was right.  The poor thing would flip onto her back when you tried to set her on her feet.  We thought maybe malnourishment so we got a bottle of warm milk for her.  No luck.

I held her and massaged the back of her neck and she fell asleep in my arms. Meri was very upset and didn't want to go to school, but today is a big day for her.  She's in Honor Choir and will be practicing with kids from all over the state this afternoon before a big concert tonight.  I made her go and promised that I'd take this pup to the vet.

Just before I took her to school, we noticed ANOTHER puppy acting the same way.  Uh Oh...  We thought that maybe when we guide Duke and Ellie outside to the yard via the laundry room, maybe one of them had accidentally stepped on a pup.  But two?  What are the odds?

I got back to the house and called the vet.  He was able to get me in right away, plus he's only a half mile away...  The puppy that Meri had discovered first today, died almost as soon as I got there with them.  We're sending her to a diagnostic lab for further testing to see if it's a virus.  The other is going to spend the morning there with an IV.  She's pretty dehydrated.  

We don't plan to tell Meri until after the concert tonight.

 

This survival of the fittest thing sucks.